The old manor
by jazzieP
Summary: More than half a year after the accident, Alec immensely regrets her desicion to come here. Well not the decision to leave her old home, that was the best thing she had done in a while. But how could she have been so stupid to think that this place would be any different, that any place would change who she was? She would never be able to control it. Now no one would be safe.
1. Prologue

_**The rest of the story can been found on fictionpress, under the same name, where my orginal is supposed to be :)**_

**For a while now, since i was young actually, i have had this story in my head. Over time it evolved and changed a lot and i finally decided to put in on paper. I have been wanting to do this for a while now, but never sure how i would be able to write down my thoughts.**

**This is not a fanfiction, it is an original. I hope that is not a problem? Also english is not my first language, so my apologies in advance if some of the grammar or spelling is incorrect. If You see a mistake and tell me, i will gladly adjust it. **

**This is the first time for me, to write a story at all. I hope you all like it. **

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**Prologue**

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An image floats in front of my eyes, a girl with wet blond hair plastered to her face, blue eyes, short height and a lean body. The water was dripping off her nose as she was standing in the rain, soaked through to the bone. She is wearing what looks like a short bleached dungaree with a white shirt containing some black letters under it. One of the straps keeping the top of the dungaree up had gotten loose. Over it she is wearing a white leather jacket. As she is standing there is notice she is carrying a lot of luggage with her. A guitar case on her back, a huge dark blue suitcase on wheels in her left hand, a black duffel bag in her right hand and another smaller leather purse is hanging from her right shoulder. How she had managed to carry all that here I couldn't begin to imagine. As I moved forward to help her out with her bags, she dissipates.

Instead I find myself standing in a big room with fire everywhere. It is extremely hot and I notice how it becomes difficult to breathe. I feel trapped as it is hard to see anything further than a meter in front of me because of all the smoke. The room looks familiar and with a start I realize that I am having the same dream again. Suddenly a loud high pitched scream comes from the left. No matter how many times I have had this dream, my heart still skipped a beat and constricted with fear every single time I heard it. I crouch down and turn to where the sound is coming from and see an open door just ahead of me. When I move forward I stumble over something and fall onto my knees with my hands forward onto the ground. My hand lands in something warm and sticky. Looking at the ground where my hands had landed, I notice a red trail on the ground moving away from me. Was it blood? Maybe from the person that was screaming? I try to watch behind me to see what I stumbled over but the smoke was getting to heavy to see anything more than my hands in front of me. 'NOOOOOOOOO' a high shrill pitched voices shouts from the area ahead of me. My heart constricts with fear. I quickly scramble low onto my feet and move forward till I see a door. Maybe this time I would find out whom that voice belonged to. As I move through the door I see fire everywhere, but I'm not afraid of it. The fire will not hurt me, won't touch me. But the smoke is making it harder to breathe so I crouch even lower while trying to follow the trail of blood forward and stop in front of a wall of fire. What now I thought? The trail is still leading onwards through the fire, could I take the risk and just walk through it? Suddenly the fire splits where the blood trail is and as I move forward, a big circular space appears surrounded by fire. Somehow the smoke inside this circle had vanished and I could see all around me. I could have sworn the screaming came from here but as I turn to look around me I see no one. Looking down to see where the blood trail would be leading me I see blood trails everywhere. The lines form some kind of intricate pattern across the floor. Directly opposite of me, another trail of blood is leading out of the circle of flames. As soon as I notice it, the flames split and a blue door appears behind it.

It's the same door I have seen for the past month now and I step through it knowing what is coming next. An ocean blue coloured round ballroom appears, everything is a tint of blue. The floors are light ocean blue, the colour is constantly slightly changing like a soft wind that is blowing across the water. And when the sunlight hits the floor, it is as if the blue is coming alive with light, the colour turns a deep bright blue. The walls have a deep blue green ocean colour, with small high ceiled windows each a about a meter apart from the other. On the ceiling there is a dark ocean blue showing the sky, it was as if you were watching into a lake that was reflecting the starry sky above you. But you weren't, because the starry blue ocean was above you, not the sky itself. The room always filled me with aw, the blue, the walls, floors, ceiling, they felt alive as the blue colour seemed to float around. I sat down, knowing this would take a while but not minding it at all. Staring at the walls and ceiling I realized it felt as if I were sitting in the ocean, water surrounding me on all sides, only the fish were missing. It was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen. Slowly the room turned dark as the sun went down and the stars above me started to shine more bright. As I watched closely, a white line appeared moving from dot to dot. Ever played those connect the dots as a kid? It was like that, only I was not the one connecting the dots. I already knew what the lines were going to form, I had seen it many times. It showed the same pattern as the blood did on the floor in the burning room.

Suddenly the room turned pitch black, I knew this would happen and where I would end up, it never changed. A green oasis appears about as big and round as the circle of fire and the ocean ballroom. A quarter of the round space showed a stone wall with a loud roaring waterfall ending in a peaceful looking lake, the other three quart of the area around me sprouted trees and bushes. It felt as if I was surrounded by a forest. The trees looked big and old, I felt like an ant sitting next to one on the grass. Expectantly I looked to my right to see the big white wolf that was coming out of the forest about any moment now. I hated this part of the dream. Many times I had tried to stop what was about to happen but nothing I did would stop what was about to happen. Whatever I tried, the wolf never noticed me, and it was if I wasn't there, except I was of course. The first time I saw the wolf I tried to hide, slowly moving back between the trees before it noticed me, but it never did. After a while I stopped being afraid and sometime after that I stopped trying to stop the wolf from reaching the pond.

The big white wolf slowly padded over to the pond and started slobbering up the water. However while the animal was drinking the water, the water slowly turned grey and a dead fish started popping up floating on the surface. The air became stuffy and smelled like dead fish and rot. While looking around me, I noticed the grass dying turning a dark shade of brown. Leaves turned brown and fell of the trees, fruits on trees and bushes rotted and fell off. Followed by some of the trees falling down, but never where I sat. Somehow the area around me stayed alive, the grass still green and the tree I was leaning against still beard fruit and had green leaves. I had tried to move around while this was happening, hoping to keep other places alive, but it did not work. As soon as I left the ground I was sitting on, the tree and grass died. I turned towards the wolf, it was backing away from the pond but it was already too late. Its fur was already turning grey and some pieces of fur where falling to the ground. The wolf, its legs not being able to carry the weight of the body anymore fell down to the ground. Not long anymore and its body would start rotting down till there was nothing left except the bones, it was horrid to watch.

Suddenly a girl started singing, her voice was beautiful, this was weird. This had never happened before, normally the wolf died and I would wake up, but now, this voice, it sounded so alive. I closed my eyes as I listened to her voice, not wanting to see the dying corps. As I opened my eyes again I saw the wolf's head was up and looking straight at me. What was happening? He wasn't dead yet? Slowly I stood up and moved towards the wolf, looking closely at him I could see that his body wasn't falling apart anymore, at some parts of the body there was even new fur growing. How was this possible? Was it because of the voice? The Wolf was still looking at me, its big brown eyes piercing me, a heavy voice filled my head '_Find her and ….._', Suddenly another loud voice boomed in and blocked the heavy voice in my head 'EMMITT'. "…_still inside of…_"... 'EMMITT' shouted the voice, I recognized as my brother's. Dammit why now, the image started fluttering and the voice became softer and almost impossible to hear, I strained to hear what it said _'….give up…_'.

'Emmitt, dammit, wake up and turn of that annoying alarm clock… ', shouted my brother from the other side of my door. Alarm clock? Well that explained the singing voice I had heard as I recognized it from a song on the radio. I turned off my alarm clock and closed my eyes to call back the image. Almost every night now I had dreamed this dream and not once had it changed. So why now? Never before had the girl been so clear. She was always shrouded in some kind of grey smoke and impossible to see any features. Every time I tried to focus on her she disappeared. 'Hurry up you are going to be late for breakfast' said my brother, he was a morning person, always up early. I dragged myself out of bed and quickly got dressed, wanting to draw the new images before they disappeared from my mind but there wasn't any time left draw in my room. The breakfast table would had to do for now. Quickly I grabbed my notebook and pencils before heading downstairs.


	2. Chapter 1

**Enjoy**

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**Chapter 1 **

**The apartment**

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"What do you mean you rented the apartment out to another person? I was supposed to get it" I said angry at the old sweaty smelly man. He was really really tall for a man his age and looked at me as if I were just a small fly buzzing annoyingly in his face that he wanted to swat away with his hands. "Well, as you missed your appointment, you missed your chance. I have a business to run young lady, my advice, next time be on time." He said impatiently at me while looking at his expensive Rolex watch. "But I was on time, you told me in the email to be here at 6 pm today. Here I am and.." i was telling him, but he rudely interrupted me. "6 pm?" the tall man snorted irritated? "10 am you lady, now move aside, I got more things to do" and he started walking down the hallway. "10 am? No it was 6 pm sir, I'm sure of it, I had to travel a long way with train to get here, 10 am would have been impossible. Here look, I will show you the email on my phone" but the man ignored me while moving to the stairs at the end of the hallway. I followed him, damm him if I was going to give up so easily, he had promised me this room. 'Hey wait a minute, how could you do this? You promised me this room, this isn't fair. We had a deal, I was supposed to get this apartment" I shouted at him while trying to keep up. He was fast for an old man, probably because he was so tall. "I arranged everything around this apartment, where am I going to stay for the semester, all other student apartments will be rented out by now, how could you do this to me!" I exclaimed. As he reached the bottoms of the staircase he suddenly turned around and I almost ran straight into him. "Well that is not my problem now is it, better learn to be on time next time" . "But I was on time" I shouted frustatedly "We had a deal" I repeated, hoping he would finally see reason. As he moved out of the front door to the car he turned to me "Be glad I was willing to meet you here so late this evening young lady, now if you will excuse me I have got pressing matters to attend to" and without looking back he stepped into his black Mercedes car and drove away.

Feeling defeated I sat down on the front steps to the front door, what had just happened? This room was supposed to be mine to rent. I had found the apartment on the internet a few months ago and immediately fell in love with it. The rooms in the apartment were all quite small but for me that did not matter. It was perfect, no other roommates, a bedroom, my own bathroom and kitchen, fully furnished and not too high a price. Weeks it had taken me to find it as this town wasn't cheap to rent a room in. Adding to that that most rooms had shared bathrooms and kitchens made it for a near impossible search. So when I saw the apartment online, I immediately contacted the landlord to tell him I was interested in the place and ask if the place was still available. A reply came almost instantly, telling me that it was still available but that if I really wanted the place to decide soon. The apartment seemed to be quite popular, but luckily for me not taken yet. It took me about 5 seconds to decide that I needed the apartment and replied back that he had a renter if he agreed with it. A lot of emails, some phone calls and a week later I had conformation that the room would be mine. Today was supposed to be the day I moved in and signed the contract. Now I had not just lost this apartment, but also the time to find a new one. By now all student apartments would be already rented out to all the other students.

I was on the brink of crying, in 5 hours it would get dark and I had no place to stay, but crying wouldn't solve anything so I got up to my feed. Time to find a hotel or a bed-and-breakfast, it didn't matter, as long as I had a bed to sleep in tonight. I picked up all my bags from the ground and started walking, dam they were heavy, why again did I decide on taking two bags and my guitar? Oh yes, train tickets to this place weren't cheap. While walking back to the bus stop where I had stepped out a street or two away from here, I thought about my options. How in this short amount of time would I find a place to sleep? And were there even any rooms left? Maybe I should just ask someone if they know a place that I could stay for the night. Maybe somewhere there was a city help desk, but even if there was, by the time I got there it would probably be closed. First thing first though, getting back to the city centre. I looked at the bus stop schedule and noticed that due to some maintenance no busses from here were travelling to the centre, which meant I had to walk there. "Why me?" I shouted to the air and signed. It was so hot, my shirt already plastered to my back with sweat. I swung my purse of my shoulder to get my phone and opened Google Maps. As if my arms and back weren't tired enough yet, it seemed I would have to walk for another 15 minutes according to Maps. "Yeah right" I snorted, make that half an hour with this entire luggage. Better be on my way.

The day had started out so well this morning. For once I had not slept through my alarm, blearing at 6 am, knowing that I would finally be leaving that house for good. I looked through my room stripped bare of all belongings, packed in my bags standing at the end of my bed. The room looked rather empty, it was a strange feeling. Strangely I had only needed two bags to pack all of my belongings. I chuckled, I couldn't say that those bags were small. They were humongous. The train tickets had been extremely pricey and I couldn't afford another ticket to pick up more. Therefore I had decided to take with me what I could carry and dump the rest. While going through my cloths I soon realized that a lot of it was old and had not been worn in years. Those I packed in plastic bags and had donated to a local charity. Somehow, don't ask me how, I had been able to pack all of my remaining clothes into the old big dark blue trolley. Most of my remaining belongings I had had to sort out between what I want to take with me and what could be thrown out or given away. I decided to give away all the old stuff like cd's, old music player and my stuffed animals left over from childhood. My guitar of course would go with me, not that it was expensive but I had had it for 10 years now and meant a lot to me. The stuff remaining had barely fit into my old duffel bag.

When I was young we often moved from house to house at least 2 times a year. Due to that I had gotten used to the packing and traveling. However we always had a truck to move all our belongings, this was the first time I had to actually leave things behind. Grabbing my alarm clock to put it into the duffel bag and realized I had to hurry or else I would still miss my train. Quickly I grabbed the clothes I had laid aside for today, a short blue old bleached dungaree and a white short sleeved shirt with black letters saying

**SHUT UP**

**LETS DANCE**

under it and moved out of my room to the shower. I had already said goodbye last night and as it was Saturday everyone was still asleep. That was fine by me, I liked the quietness while eating my breakfast at the kitchen table. It was almost 6.30 and I would have to leave or miss by buss to the station, I walked through the house a last time, grabbed my bags and walked out of the front door for the last time.

The train ride had lasted more than 5 hours due to some unforeseen problems with the rails, or something like that. I hadn't bothered to listen any further and had tuned out the conductor's voice by putting the earplugs of my iPod back in. We were nearing the station and I was about to get my first view of the city. Straight ahead of us, a tunnel was leading to the others side of the mountain where there was a valley surrounded by other mountains. As we moved out of the tunnel I could see the city lying in the valley ahead of us, I sat up straight and realized I had gotten lucky by sitting on the right side. The windows on the left only showed the rock wall of the mountain. Gazing out of the window, I noticed a sparkly lake lying right of the city. It lay in its own small valley between some hills full with forest forming the beginning of the mountain. The city itself looked rather old, it was surrounded on three side by a river originating from the lake and seeming to disappear into the mountain beneath me. The centre was fully surrounded by a small rocky river that had branched of the main river and it reminded me of the way people used to start a village centuries ago.

A soft wind had picked up and brushed my hot skin. Sniffing my nose, I noticed a new smell hanging in the air. Smell of coming rain? Nah it couldn't be, the sky was still blue with the sun shining bright. The wind though was rather welcome as it still was 30 °_**C. A**_ few streets further I saw dark clouds coming from the mountain. I quickened my pace, but with all these bags, going faster was rather difficult to achieve. Slowly it got darker and darker I realized a storm was about to come and I would have to hurry, not long now and the rain would start coming down. The city centre was close by now and as I turned left I saw the river surrounding the centre at the end of the street. Almost there, but it was too late, I could feel water drops spatting on my bare arms. Shit I would get soaked through if I didn't find a place to hide and quick. Immediately I put down my bags and grabbed my white leather jacket out of the duffel bag, put it on, picked up my bags and broke out into a sprint. After crossing the river, I saw the shopping area coming up, sadly all the shops were already closed. Not that weird, considering it was already past 6 p.m.. Just a little further, there would be a turn left with an alley leading to the plaza where all kinds of little bars and restaurants where. As I was nearing the alley, all hell broke loose above me, the first lightning bold crossed the sky near the mountains in front of me. The sight of it mesmerizing, everything lighting up, followed by the darkness, all in the blink of an eye, but the scene was burned in my mind like a picture. By now the rain had turned from a drizzle into a full out shower while I maneuvered myself into the alley with all my bags. I was soaked through the bone by the time I neared the plaza, hopefully I could at the least reach a restaurant or café before.. "KABAMMMM" A loud crack like a canon boomed through the air above me and made my heart skip with fear. Kind of ironic how I loved the lightning but feared the thunder sounds following it. Just in front of me a cosy warm and especially dry looking Café was standing there very inviting, did I mention dry?

Quickly I went through the door and was welcomed by the murmuring sounds of people talking and soft music coming from my left. Right in front of me an intricate metal spiral stairway was leading to a dance area upstairs, I could hear the loud music and thumping through the ceiling. The wooden door to my left opened just as I was about to enter, an older couple looking amused at me hurried outside together under a big umbrella. Why they had an umbrella with them while the sky was so clear 15 minutes ago I couldn't fathom. I moved through the door inside the café, the place looked old, the wall behind the bar was dark brown and bricked while the others were plastered with a light crème colour. A male voice was singing an old song on the radio "..I am singiiiiiingggg in the rain, just singiiiiingggg in the rain, such a glorious feeeeeeling, I'm haaaaaaappy again. I'm laaaaughing at the clouds, so darkkkk up abovvvvvve…"1. Seriously? Off all the songs they could have played, it was one about being happy in the rain? The irony.

Suddenly a body move in front of me and I had to look up. The guy was almost a head bigger than me and was wearing a black shirt with black jeans. His blond hair slightly long was tied back in a ponytail but a lock of hair had gotten free and was dangling half in front of his dark green eyes. "Would you like some help with that?" he asked me amused while looking at my bags. Surprised that he had asked I took a better look at him and noticed his shirt had a tiny logo with the café's name on it '_Castille_'. "There might not be much space here to place them, but I could move them into the back room behind the bar" he told me while pointing to the back. I followed his arm to where he was indicating. At the wall in front of me stood a mahony coloured bar spread from the left side till half of the room. The bar was filled with drinking guests sitting on the bar stools in front of it. The wall behind the bar was showed an amazing collection of all kind of glasses and bottles of liquor. The café seemed far bigger on the inside than I had imagined, the room went all the way back for at least another 20 meter and at my left was a huge bay window with a few tables in front of it. Along the wall, they had placed small round wooden tables with the same colour as the bar and were the bar ended other round tables took its place. Depending on how much space there was left there would be a max of 2 till four chairs around each table. The room was quite small, so I could understand why he wanted my bags out of the way. It was quite busy, as almost all the tables were occupied, most of them enjoying dinner while the ones at the bar where here to get a drink. The waiters were probably busy enough without them tripping over my bags. "Sure, no problem" I replied "can I take that table over there?" I asked. I had noticed a small table barely fitting between the left side of the bar and the bay window. "Go ahead, can I get you something hot to drink? You look like you are quite cold in those wet clothes" he asked me while picking up my trolley and duffel bag. I chuckled "That would be great, thank you, a glass of warm milk with a shot of espresso in it would do it for this drenched cat". He laughed, "Coming right up little kitten" and winked at me while he moved with my bags to the back room. I felt myself turning beet red, ow my god, had I really just said that and did he just wink at me? Wait, had he just now called me LITTLE Kitten? I groaned, not knowing what part was worse. Just when I thought this day couldn't get any more afield, here I was proving myself wrong yet again.

I put my guitar against the wall and sat down on the chair against the wall with the window on the right. Laying my head down on table and having a lonesome pity party for myself I heard my stomach rumbling. Well that was to be expected, the last time I had eaten was immediately after I had stepped out of the train. 5 hours sitting still with nothing to do could make a girl very hungry, so hungry that I had nearly forgotten my purse while storming of to the nearest Sandwich store on the station I saw. Luckily for me, one of the travellers sitting near me had run after me to give it to me. All of a sudden a fluffy towel dropped over my head and a voice I recognized as the ponytail guy said "Don't fall asleep yet little Kitten, your milk is here". I heaved my heavy head to meet his gaze "seriously, little kitten?". He winked at me again, placed my Latte on the table and was about to walk over to another table. "Wait" I called out "could you bring me a menu? I am starving". He turned towards me with a big smile "No problem Kitty " and moved on to another table. I sighed, Kitty? Maybe if I told him my name he would stop with the ridiculous cat names. I took the towel and try to dry my hair with it, followed by my face, arms and legs. My image reflected to me in the window and I tried to redo my hair a little, but it was a lost cause. A minute later he was back placing a menu on the table and picking up the wet towel. "My name is Alec, so please stop giving me cat names" I told him. He barked out a laugh "The name is Emmitt, you new here?" I looked at him surprised "Yes how would you know?". "Well the ones living here know by now that after such a beautiful summer day a storm will follow" A loud clank came from behind him and he glanced at table where a plate full of food was swiped of by a kid. "Excuse me I will be right back to take your order". Well that explained why the older couple had an umbrella with them. I glanced at the menu and decided on a dish called 'Summer special' it didn't say what kind of dish it was.

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_Summer special_

–

_Let the cook surprise you his with summer specialty_

_This dish contains local products._

_If you let the waiter know if you have any special diet wishes or allergies the cook will make take that into account._

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Secretly I looked over the top of my menu and watch the ponytail guy get a broom from the back to swipe up the debris. He had a nice ass I though as my eyes narrowed done on his butt. Apparently I wasn't the only one thinking so, I saw a group of single women giggling while pointing to his butt. So far for being subtle, didn't these women realize that everyone could see them? One of the women moved in front of him when he tried to move back to the backroom to put away the broom, she shamelessly started flirting with him. While I rather enjoyed seeing him trying to get out this situation I felt slightly bad for him. The place was extremely busy, didn't the woman realize that he had more to do than talk to her? He finally got past her and moved into the back room. I took a sip from my Latte and gazed aimlessly in front of me while thinking about what to about tonight.

"Have you decided?" Emmitt asked disturbing me out of my thoughts. I hadn't seen him come up. "Yes I would like the Summer special please, I got no allergies or diets or anything like that" I told him while placing down the menu. "Coming right up" he smiled and picked up the menu. "Do you maybe know if there is a hotel or something like that nearby here?". His eyes widened a bit at my question "you came here, with two big bags and still haven't a place reserved to stay for the night" he asked taken aback. I sighed "it is a long story, suffice it to say that my pre rented room was given away to someone else". I must have looked truly desperate while saying that as the look on his face was full of pity. He looked over at a big clock hanging on the wall above the bar "Tell you what kitten, in little more than an hour the crowd here will have thinned out and I have my break, if you wait around, I will try to help you out" but before I could answer that that wasn't necessary he had moved on to help another customer.

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1 Singing in the rain by Gene Kelley


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